HORSE. — St. Paul, addressing the Corinthians, urges them to act so as to reach the goal, that is, heaven, just as in the stadium where many run and only one wins the prize: “sic currite ut comprehendatis” (1 Cor 9:24).
The horse thus represents the faithful in the race of life; in a graffito from Tharros, a horse is depicted with the owner’s brand replaced by the monogram of Christ (G. B. De Rossi, Del cavallo simbolico sull’iscrizione di Tharros, in Bull. di archeol. crist., 2nd ser., 4 [1873], pp. 135–39 and pl. XI, 2); in an inscription from Trier, the monogrammatic cross with the letters A and Ω is seen between two horses (E. Le Blant, Recueil des inscriptions chrétiennes de la Gaule, Paris 1866, pl. XXXI, no. 188). Of a deceased person it is said in his inscription that he “cucurrit opere maxime,” that is, he had run the course of good works. The horse is also represented on the reverse of terracotta lamps; specimens with horses bearing a cross-shaped brand have been found at Carthage and Syracuse. At times, however, the horse merely indicates the trade practiced by the deceased, as in the well-known inscription of Domitilla, where the deceased Constantius guides his two horses named Barbarus and Germanus.